Katy Toastmasters

12/02/2024

At our November 21 meeting, we embraced the holiday spirit through a lively Table Topic discussion, where members warmly exchanged their unique Thanksgiving 🦃 activities, from cherished family recipes to meaningful traditions. Our Toastmaster for the week was Linda Goldberg who led us on an engaging session before the festive season.

We have 3 speakers at varying stages of their pathway journey:

🪴 Asha Patel shared her story and beliefs in her Ice Breaker speech.

🪴 Zaida O’Connor presented her slide deck on using media to create engaging presentations with her speech titled "The Art".

🪴 Mukta Satewar shared her experiences with networking through her professional and academic volunteering work with her speech titled "The Impact of Networking".

Congratulations 👏 to our 2 award winners for the evening:
🏅 Troy Rockett for the Best Table Topic Speaker!
🏅 Chandra Munagavalasa for the Best Speech Evaluator!

11/17/2024

Our meeting theme for November 14 is “Sadie Hawkins Day” with a strong flavor of old newspaper comic strips🗞️. Our Toastmaster for the week is Andrew a.k.a. Andy, who basically learned to read from comic strips and comic books.

📢 This evening, we welcomed our new member, Asha Patel! We are excited to have you in our club! 🎉

We have 2 prepared speech speakers who captivated everyone with their storytelling:

🪴 Jennifer Moore Sasu with her speech titled "Life Lessons from My 4-Year Old", vividly describing her 'parenting' experience with her 4-year-old dog.

🪴 Andrew Paultanis recounted his childhood days when he learned to read from comic strips and comic books with his Ice-breaker speech.

And congratulations to our 2 award winners for the evening:

🏅 Troy Rockett for the Best Table Topic Speaker!
🏅 Zaida O’Connor for the Best Speech Evaluator!

11/11/2024

Congratulations to Katy Toastmasters Club on achieving the President's Distinguished Club 2023-2024!

We had an incredible meeting filled with inspiration, storytelling, and camaraderie! Here's a recap of our amazing speakers and award recipients.

🎉 Welcome to our New Member: Day Antony! We’re thrilled to have you join our club.

🎤 Speakers of the Day:

- Mukta Satewar captivated us with her engaging speech, "Lost and Learned".

- Danielle Williams inspired us with her talk, "Bucket List".

- Andrew Paultanis took his seasoned first step with his ice-breaker speech.

🏆 Congratulations to Our Award Winners:

- Best Table Topic Speaker: Manjiree Parandekar for her quick wit and engaging responses!

- Best Speech Evaluator: Conan Nguyen for his insightful and constructive feedback.

Thank you to everyone who participated and made this meeting a success. Here’s to more growth and unforgettable moments together at Toastmasters! 🌟

09/25/2024

Toastmasters International wants to know your thoughts on Base Camp badges 😲 Check it out!

✔ Take a moment to share your thoughts on Base Camp badges by completing our quick survey. 📋 https://lnkd.in/gWK-cVsX

09/24/2024

Last Thursday, our Toastmasters meeting was a shining example of servant leadership in action. Our Toastmaster of the Day, Zaida, exemplified this theme perfectly.

From Trung's last-minute step-in as General Evaluator who provided invaluable feedback and then to Troy, Jonathan, and Matthew's willingness to step in for roles, our members demonstrated a true commitment to serving one another.

Our speeches were captivating, informative, and inspiring. Jennifer took us behind the scenes of news programming, while Bhupendra's talk on Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers reminded us of the power of practice. Stephanie's introduction to Singlish was both educational and ✨SHIOK! ✨

Our longstanding Toastmaster, Andy, always provides thought-provoking Table Topics questions with Neha sharing her admiration for a role model to Samson motivating us with his story about asking for help. We also want to congratulate Pooja for completing her first evaluation!

Ready to make a positive impact and grow as a leader? Join us at our next meeting on October 3! Guests welcome!

09/21/2024

On September 12, our Toastmasters meeting was a night to remember! We were inspired, we grew, and we learned so much.

A huge thank you to Trung, our VPE, for stepping in as presiding officer, and to Linda, our Toastmaster for the evening, for introducing such a thought-provoking topic—adaptability. Her reference to the book Who Moved My Cheese reminded us of the importance of embracing change.

We were captivated by three incredible speeches. Priyanka's yoga journey had us laughing and thinking about giving it another try. Flora's talk about cooking with others reminded us of the artistry and connection that can be found in the kitchen. Leslie’s reflection on her Engaging Humor pathways proved to us that less is more.

We love it when our member’s step up: Andy P. demonstrated his leadership in evaluating a first-time evaluator.

During Table Topics, we were treated to thoughtful questions that led to memorable responses. Special shoutouts to Matthew and Samson for their insightful answers.

Be part of a community that supports growth and inspiration!

09/10/2024

Happy September! (which is on point for our 9/5 meeting theme "Happy")

Our Toastmaster of the Day Trung led our meeting and reminded us that happy is not a destination, but a state of mind. A great message for all 😀

✨ We officially inducted two new members to Katy Toastmasters Club - welcome Aldo and Jennifer!

✨ Min described her story about the Rooftop of Africa (Mt Kilimanjaro) as if we were there

✨ Aldo did his first Ice Breaker and we got to know about who he is and how his upbringing engineered his path.

✨ Matthew continue his Matt-a-morphisis (now a saga) and brought us to tears about breaking from his parental prison.

✨ DD took on Table Topics Master and gave us great questions related to school. It ranged from memories to how can we be better!

We can choose our happy and be ✨ joyful ✨ ! See you at the next meeting on September 12!

08/19/2024

Our 8/15 meeting was a testament to the incredible power of the spoken word (theme prepared by our Toastmaster of the Day, Ala).

Highlights

We witnessed a dynamic display of verbal prowess from our speakers:

⚡️Jody commanded attention with the silent yet potent language of body language, decoding S.H.E.P. for us all.

⚡️ Zaida illuminated the distinct role of being a mentor, casting light on the path to growth.

⚡️ Stephanie transported us to imaginative realms through the power of storytelling, sharing the worlds within their favorite books.

⚡️ Matthew embarked on his Matt-a-morphisis, initiating a trilogy with the captivating force of humor.

⚡️ Priyanka ignited minds with her Table Topics Master debut, igniting sparks of brilliance from our courageous volunteers.

⚡️Welcome to our newest member, Jennifer, who boldly stepped into the spotlight as Listen Master!

Join us as we continue to unleash the power of our words and inspire one another. We can't wait to see what unfolds next on September 5!

08/04/2024

EMBRACE the UNEXPECTED.
A great reminder from our meeting on August 1st.

Highlights

🔹Our Toastmaster of the Day, Kathy, led our meeting with a resilient theme. I truly enjoyed how she described it as “moving forward with grace and dignity” as the unexpected happens.

🔹 We welcomed back a returning member, Bhupendra and during his table topics, he has decided to do the unexpected of redoing his Toastmasters journey!

🔹We awarded our member Mukta for completing Level 2 in Presentation Mastery and for winning the Area International Speech contest

🔹Our two speakers for the night shared their story, Pooja introducing herself with her first icebreaker and Zaida motivating us to be radical leaders.

Our next meeting is coming up, August 8th! We got a full stack of speakers already signed up.

07/28/2024

Another week, another meeting! We held our 2nd meeting of July on the 25th. It was truly inspirational and we were taken on an adventure of growth and forward thinking.

Highlights

💡Our first speaker, Irwan, did his final speech for Pathways Dynamic Leadership. He shared his reflection in the best way possible…by breaking down his G.O.A.L.

💡Our second speaker, Joanna (VPPR), shared the project she has been working on. Katy Toastmasters 2.0 Website - www.katytoastmasters.org ! The POWER-UP our club deserves. (Check it out!)

💡Table Topics Master Ala took us on a time skip to 20 years in the future and we heard great responses from our topic speakers about technology, teachers, travel, hobbies, and the environment.

💡Our evaluators, Kathy and Jonathan, gave excellent feedback to our speakers that would drive them forward onto their next speech.

💡Shout to Andy and Stephanie for stepping in our supporting roles for our meeting 🙌